Kanck condemns reporting of ecstasy comment

[apothecary]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200605/s1638670.htm

South Australian Democrat MP Sandra Kanck says her views on the illegal drug MDMA, or ecstasy, have been misrepresented.

Ms Kanck has released a statement defending her speech to the Upper House of state Parliament last week.

In it she said there was no evidence that MDMA is dangerous and could have been used therapeutically by victims of the Eyre Peninsula fires.

She says her comments were related to its therapeutic use and linking them with recreational use is to trawl the bottom of journalistic ethics.

Her former Upper House colleague Ian Gilfillan has defended her views but with a qualification.

"I would suggest that, on reflection, Sandra may have worded what she wanted to say better," he said.

In her statement, Ms Kanck adds that she intends to serve all of her remaining four years as an Upper House MP.

The executive of the state Democrats has distanced itself from the comments by the party's last remaining Upper House member.

Party state president Richard Pascoe says those comments do not reflect Democrat policy.

"People are stunned by the statements, not very happy with the statements at all, you know, how much damage has this done to the party?" he said.

"You know we're all working to rebuild the Democrats in South Australia and rebuild the profile, and those sorts of comments don't help."

[occidentalis]

I think Sandra deserves a letter of support for her ability to come to a rational conclusion even if it is contrary to party lines, so I'm going to send her an email. If you'd like to also, here's her addy: [email protected]

[apothecary]

Definitely.

Also emailing words of dissapproval to [email protected] couldn't hurt.

[occidentalis]

Actually Sandra sounds really cool all round:

Active over the years in campaigns about French nuclear testing, US bases in Australia, uranium mining and waste management, Sandra is a member of many community groups including Sustainable Population Australia, of which she is the South Australian President, and the Australia-East Timor Friendship Association, of which she is a patron.

Sandra led the first delegation to Vietnam in 1994 of the Australian Political Exchange Council. In 2003 she was part of a delegation to the Philippines of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Population and Development.

The South Australian Voluntary Euthanasia Society has awarded Sandra with life membership, and the South Australian Branch of the College of Midwives gave her the inaugural "Midwife Advocate of the Year" Award.

[Torsten]

they both got an email from me. finally a non-ignorant politician and the wolves are trying the shred her.

[RonnySimulacrum]

Well it is good to see one progressive politician, pity she won’t get far

[trixxy3]

 

Read what she said.

[apothecary]

Thanks for that trix.

[Hagakure]

emails sent

good to see this type speech in any house of parliment

[spice]

Uh oh, a politician with a sound mind, she won't last long.

[occidentalis]

Looks like our messages of support made a difference:

http://www.couriermail.news.com.au/story/0...5003402,00.html

Her comments follow last week's resignation of Democrats national president Richard Pascoe, who quit in disgust after Ms Kanck said there was no evidence ecstasy was dangerous.

[-YT-]

 

Worked a stall at a local very publisied Rave here in Adelaide, i went for a wander and ran into some other ethnobots from the meets who mentioned that Sandra Kanck & David Colldicot were both there at the Rave . The next day Offcourse there was an article condeming her and her statements towards MDMA and its usage etc, Its good to see people supporting her. There was an interesting reply from MAPS that a awesome local bought to the last meet i shall try and find a copy too post.

[Torsten]

MAPS sets the record straight for Saandra Kanck (thank you to Samantha Lee for keeping me up to date on this). The conservatives are making a lot of noise and we must do the same to support sensible people like Sandra and Samantha. South Australia may well lead the way in this debate which inevitably has to come down to the truth and not media spin. Hang in there Sandra!!

MAPS Response to Advertiser piece “Sandra, here’s the truth on ecstasy” (7/7/06),

by Rick Doblin ([email protected]) and Ilsa Jerome, www.maps.org.

The commentary “Sandra, Here’s the Truth on Ecstasy” conflates feeling low shortly after ecstasy use with persistent depression. A small percentage of people given pure MDMA in research studies report low mood or fatigue afterwards, but the feelings are gone within a week (Liechti et al. 2001; Vollenweider et al. 1998). The link between long-lasting depression and ecstasy use is far less clear. First of all, two studies, one conducted in the Netherlands and the other in Germany (Huizink et al. 2006; Lieb et al. 2002), found that mental disorders or psychological problems tended to predate and perhaps lead to ecstasy use rather than the other way around. Furthermore, substance use is generally linked with feeling anxious or depressed, and most ecstasy users, like the young man described in the piece, use drugs other than ecstasy (Milani et al. 2004; Scholey et al. 2004). Some researchers in Germany have even found that psychological problems are more strongly linked to cannabis use than to ecstasy use (Daumann et al. 2001; Daumann et al. 2004). For the most part, studies looking at depressed feelings in ecstasy users rely on measures that ask people to describe how they feel rather than using formal diagnoses by a qualified psychiatrist (Sumnall et al. 2005), and studies that do use diagnoses fail to find a link between ecstasy use and depression (de Win et al. 2004; Halpern et al. 2004; Thomasius et al. 2005). The ecstasy users who report feeling depressed take the drug heavily, often reporting that they took ecstasy on at least fifty occasions in their lifetimes (Falck et al. 2004), and with most studies of ecstasy users requiring people to have taken ecstasy from at least 20 to at least 50 times (for example Daumann et al. 2004; Thomasius et al. 2005). A single use of ecstasy might make someone feel low for a few days, but it is extremely unlikely that ecstasy use on its own would lead to long-lasting depression. Lastly, there is to date there is no evidence between lower amounts of brain serotonin in ecstasy users and indications of depression, with one study even failing to find a link (de Win et al. 2004). Taken together, this suggests that ecstasy is being unfairly blamed for depression in people who generally are using plenty of other substances besides ecstasy and who may in fact be self-medicating already existing problems. Ecstasy may not be making people happier, but it’s not making them more depressed.

Sandra Kanck may not have seen the “dark side” of ecstasy use, but it is probably not all that different from the dark side of alcohol use.

It’s also fair to point out that what is sold on the street as “ecstasy” may contain little or no MDMA, and that street ecstasy can often contain other substances, including amphetamine and methamphetamine, two stimulants strongly associated with producing a “crash” (Baggott et al. 2000; Cole and Sumnall 2002; Tanner-Smith 2006).

Finally, Kanck’s recommendation that ecstasy users test their tablets can hardly be read as implying that taking the pills is “safe.” Rather, testing ecstasy tablets is an attempt to make a risky activity safer, and would not be needed if in fact people knew what was in the pills to start with. True, testing pills would not prevent other risks of ecstasy use, such as overheating, but it would go a long way to reducing risks created when people unintentionally take mixes of drugs, including mixes that may be more toxic or troublesome than each drug alone.

Note: Not every possible paper is referenced here, but only those directly addressing the issues and using reviews or meta-analyses when possible.

References:

Baggott M, Heifets B, Jones RT, Mendelson J, Sferios E, Zehnder J. (2000) No abstract Chemical analysis of ecstasy pills. JAMA. 284: 2190.

Cole JC, Bailey M, Sumnall HR, Wagstaff GF, King LA. (2002)The content of ecstasy tablets: implications for the study of their long-term effects. Addiction. 2002 Dec;97(12):1531-1536.

Daumann J, Pelz S, Becker S, Tuchtenhagen F, Gouzoulis-Mayfrank E (2001) Psychological profile of abstinent recreational Ecstasy (MDMA) users and significance of concomitant cannabis use. Hum Psychopharmacol 16 :627-633

Daumann J, Hensen G, Thimm B, Rezk M, Till B, Gouzoulis-Mayfrank E (2004) Self- reported psychopathological symptoms in recreational ecstasy (MDMA) users are mainly associated with regular cannabis use: further evidence from a combined cross-sectional/longitudinal investigation. Psychopharmacol (Berl) 173 :398-404.

Falck RS, Wang J, Carlson RG, Siegal HA. (2005) Prevalence and correlates of current depressive symptomatology among a community sample of MDMA users in Ohio. Addict Behav 31: 90-101.

Halpern JH, Pope HG, Sherwood AR, Barry S, Hudson JH, Yurgelun-Todd D (2004) Residual neuropsychological effects of illicit 3,4- methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) in individuals with minimal exposure to other drugs. Drug Alcohol Depend 75: 135-147.

Huizink AC, Ferdinand RF, van der Ende J, Verhulst FC. (2006) Symptoms of anxiety and depression in childhood and use of MDMA: prospective, population based study.BMJ 332: 825-828. Epub 2006 Feb 24.

Lieb R, Schuetz CG, Pfister H, von Sydow K, Wittchen H (2002) Mental disorders in ecstasy users: a prospective-longitudinal investigation. Drug Alcohol Depend 68:195-207.

Liechti ME, Gamma A, Vollenweider FX (2001a) Gender differences in the subjective effects of MDMA. Psychopharmacol 154:161-168.

Milani RM, Parrott AC, Turner JJ, Fox (2004) Gender differences in self-reported anxiety, depression, and somatization among ecstasy/MDMA polydrug users, alcohol/tobacco users, and nondrug users. Addict Behav 29: 965-971.

Scholey AB, Parrott AC, Buchanan T, Heffernan TM, Ling J, Rodgers J (2004) . Increased intensity of Ecstasy and polydrug usage in the more experienced recreational Ecstasy/MDMA users: a WWW study. Addict Behav 29: 743-775.

Singer LT, Linares TJ, Ntiri S, Henry R, Minnes S. (2004) Psychosocial profiles of older adolescent MDMA users. Drug Alcohol Depend 74:245-252.

Sumnall HR, Wagstaff GF, Cole JC (2004) Self-reported psychopathology in polydrug users. J Psychopharmacol 18: 75-82.

Sumnall HR, Cole JC. (2005) Self-reported depressive symptomatology in community samples of polysubstance misusers who report Ecstasy use: a meta-analysis.

J Psychopharmacol 19: 84-92.

Tanner-Smith EE. (2006) Pharmacological content of tablets sold as "ecstasy": Results from an online testing service. Drug Alcohol Depend. 83:247-254. Epub 2005 Dec 20.

Thomasius R, Petersen KU, Zapletalova P, Wartberg L, Zeichner D, Schmoldt A.(2005) Mental disorders in current and former heavy ecstasy (MDMA) users. Addiction. 100: 1310-1319.

Vollenweider FX, Gamma A, Liechti M, Huber T (1998) Psychological and cardiovascular effects and short-term sequelae of MDMA ("ecstasy") in MDMA- naive healthy volunteers. Neuropsychopharmacol 19:241-251.

Original Advertiser article here: http://www.theadvertiser.news.com.au/commo...5936,19711645%2

[-YT-]

 

Excellant T one step ahead of me, And much love too Sam for making the MAPS response to the advertiser piece available for all to read

 

[Pala]

First of all, well done MP Kanck!

However, regarding the MAPS piece posted by Torsten: I felt they were a bit quick with the statement 'Ecstasy may not be making people happier, but it’s not making them more depressed.' For eg. the Thomasius (2005) paper (I only read the abstract) refered to in the article did find that 'Substance-induced affective, anxiety and cognitive disorders occurred more frequently among ecstasy users than polydrug controls.'

Also MAPS suggested that the depression link may be due to self-medicating, although the above paper concluded that 'The motivation for ecstasy use is not likely to be self-medication of pre-existing depressive or anxiety disorders as these did not occur more frequently in the ecstasy users than in control '.

It should be noted that:

• (According to MAPS) the same paper required "people to have taken ecstasy from at least 20 to at least 50 times"
  
• I only looked at one paper
  
• Abstract made no mention of methadology (eg. did they account for e impurity?)
  

So while commending MAP for making scientific information that should be known, known, well it aint a black 'n white issue. Alcohol eats up your liver, sugar cane helps digest your teeth, those cheap takeaways with MSG 'll give you cancer, so I doubt ecstasy's any different.

The most important conclusion is like Kanck mentioned in her speech, be informed.

(And enjoy)